Manoa Faculty Senate Executive Committee Minutes of October 23, 2006

The SEC meeting was called to order by Chair Tiles at 3:20 p.m.. Attending were Chin, Cox, Lampe Rutter and Staff. The SEC met with VC Francisco Hernandez from 2:00-3:20 pm, with Vice-Chair Chin leading the discussion. A summary of that discussion is attached.

The Minutes of October 16 were approved.

The SEC agreed that they wanted to have an individual session with each candidate for the Associate Vice Chancellor position currently being recruited. Also, individual meetings will be requested when the VCAFO finalists are being interviewed on campus. Tiles will ask Chancellor Konan about this, making the SEC’s desire clear.

Tiles reported there is no progress yet on the Faculty Handbook project, but the timeline presses for getting started. The SEC noted a general problem: Senate committees frequently are not paying attention to their kuleana.. It is difficult, for example, to get comments back on the WASC document.

The Task Force on Assessment was discussed. Assignments were made to various SEC members to talk to faculty who had been recommended, and to report to Tiles quickly on whether these individuals would be willing to serve, and to get started quickly. Tiles distributed to the SEC an article entitled “The Legitimacy of Assessment.” (Chronicle.com, Vol 53, Issue 5, Page B24).

It was noted that the Chancellor’s Planning Day has been rescheduled. The SEC will likely contribute a poster on good governance.

At 4:30, the SEC adjourned to meet privately with Chancellor Konan and an assistant.

Summary of Discussion with VC Hernandez:

Hernandez summarized the status of the new dorm housing project. Since the system person who had been helping oversee this project left the position, he now plans to hire a project manager on a temporary basis, who will report to him. Hernandez will take responsibility for reviewing and approving all change orders as the construction moves forward. The structure will have 12 floors, with a mixture of 2 and 4 bedroom units. There are no kitchens; students must purchase a meal plan. There will be 814 beds. The structure will have a few offices and one meeting room on the top floor. Also there will be resident staff, and a few efficiency apartments are being included for these staff. Hernandez also reported he is gathering input on how the building should be managed (internal staff or external contract). There is an ad-hoc group advising him, with ASUH representation.

As for other housing projects, Johnson and Noelani dorms need to be redeveloped. It has not been determined if the current structures will be renovated, or if other knock-downs will occur. Repair and maintenance is being prioritized, with the first priority being safety issues that need to be fixed, and secondly, major maintenance will be tackled.

Residence priorities: Currently, first-time freshmen and transfers have priority. There has been a long-standing agreement that empty beds may be offered to KCC or other UH system students on the wait-list. This would be the only way that students from other campuses could be accommodated.

Hernandez will be asking for $100 million this year to facilitate necessary housing plans and upgrades.

Other projects have been second priority, but Hernandez hopes to get to the following tasks this year:

1. More focus on the unfinished reorganization. OSA needs to develop its own strategic plan.

2. Obtain new funding. He is working with the SEED office to develop some grant proposals for enhancing diversity, etc.

3. Academic linkages for housing will be critical. He will want SEC and MFS input as they proceed.